What the Fran

Not the End of the World, actually

When I first heard about Hannah Ritchie's Not the End of the World, I thought, Oh, so like Factfulness but for the environment. And sure enough in the introduction, Ritchie talks about Hans Rosling and Factfulness. Gapminder and Our World in Data are referred to frequently, to give you the vibe.

I bought a paper copy because I already knew I'd be lending it out to people. Hence the delay writing up this post - because the book was at my mum's for a while.

The central sort of thesis it needs to be approached with is

On which there is a longer article from Our World in Data.

It's a pushback against doomerism from, I think, a realistic place.

Which side do we want to come down on?

There are sections on sustainability, air pollution, climate change, deforestation, food, biodiversity loss, ocean plastics, and overfishing. The format is the same: the issue, how we got to now, where we are today, what we need to do. There are gasps on every page - my wife was just like, "Go on then, tell me the statistic."

One of the wildest sections is on the massive disparity between what people think makes the biggest impact (recycling) versus what is actually most effective (giving up your SUV). Recycling isn't even close to the top of the list, it's actually at the bottom of the medium-impact actions.

My niece is nine and very into the environment and I don't want her to get anxious about any of this. I tell her when I was her age everyone was very worried about a hole in the ozone layer and got together and fixed it! This is used as an example in the book - ozone-depleting substances have fallen by 99.7% since 1989. It would be great to have a kid edition.

Chosen almost at random, plastic in the ocean. The Gapminder question: What share of all plastic waste in the world ends up in the oceans?

A. Less than 6%
B. Around 36%
C. More than 66%

Eighty-six per cent of people thought that the answer was B or C. It's A. About one million tonnes, probably less than 6% in fact. And this is the point of the book. One million tonnes is real bad. But it's nowhere near as bad as people think. It's a whole lot better than tens or hundreds of millions of tonnes.

Many people might be more optimistic about our ability to tackle plastic pollution if they knew that only a few per cent of it ends up there. If you believe that more than two-thirds, or even one-third, of our plastics are dumped in the ocean, it can easily feel like your efforts to fix it are hopeless.

Earlier in the book plastic comes to the rescue in preventing food waste - this constant balancing shows how shades of grey everything is. And how there are solutions everywhere.

Along with having to keep multiple truths in mind we have to accept that what's actually effective can look bad, or be counter intuitive. Be open to facts that challenge us. I have a gut reaction against nuclear power. It feels so wrong. But it's really effective. I have to reconcile that.

I do disagree with some of Ritchie's takes. She thinks we can capitalism our way out of this. I'm... not so sure. And even if we could, if we're rebuilding the world for the better why not fix that too?

Overall, would massively recommend.

Filed in reading and referenced in Refusing to be doomed 11th August 2026